Mason Chen, Student, Stanford OHS
Patrick Giuliano, Senior Analytical Technical Support Engineer, JMP
Charles Chen, Advisor, STEAMS
This STEM paper studies the time series Antarctic glacier mass from April 2002 to March 2021. The objective of this paper is to forecast the Antarctic glacier mass level for 2021-2041. Among four STEM components: Science is geoscience of the glacier; Technology is using the GRACE-FO satellites to collect glacier ice sheet mass data; Engineering would focus on the COVID-19 factor on the glacier melting rate, and mathematics is mainly on time series ARIMA models. Both non-seasonal and seasonal ARIMA models were studied and compared. Both the 12-month seasonal pattern and long-term year-to-year trend were significantly observed. The glacier melting rate was 2% faster based on the seasonal ARIMA model. Smoothing models were also significantly identified in the seasonal ARIMA model to smooth out the random noise component to enhance the time series trend and the seasonal component to enhance the forecasting model. Forecasting glacier melting for 2021-2041 would be a challenging task to address both seasonal and trend components for a longer horizontal time from today. The prediction interval would become too wide to predict the future glacier melting rate, if more than 5 years away. The seasonal ARIMA model could provide a better fit than the non-seasonal ARIMA model. STEM methodology is a powerful and holistic way of conducting scientific research projects by modern GRACE-FO Technology in a practical engineering sense through a mathematical ARIMA forecasting analysis.
